Editorial + High Fashion Model. Creative Director.

I Got Way Off Topic

I’m fat. It’s something that you can see when you first meet me. Most of America is fat; the average female size is 16 now. Calling me “fat” is not an insult, because I won’t allow it to be an insult. You might as well replace “fat” with “yellow-haired” or “blue-eyed” or “white” because all are truthful and accurate.

I am currently in the (very much) infancy stages of a possible new relationship [read “I hope this one lasts longer than a month because he seems mentally and financially stable, and he makes me laugh”] and we had an interesting conversation last night after I called myself “fat.” He is not a fat person, and it was apparent that he was uncomfortable with the idea of using “fat” as a descriptor for me. He told me that the plus size women he knows don’t like the word, and he has learned not to call people fat. Welcome to Society - where “fat” is an insult and ignorant body-shaming Cheetos can be President!

Listen, you might be one of these plus size women who do not like being called “fat”, and that is ok. I urge you to discover within yourself why you don’t like the word, and if you are up for changing your mind. I used to hate being called “fat” but it was because the people around me insisted on this word meaning bad/dumb/stupid/gross. “Fat” does not mean those things.

I was going to put in the Merriam-Webster definition of “fat” in this blog post, when I realized that one of the last versions of the definition actually lists “stupid; foolish” as a valid descriptor of the word. This is the world we live in. This is why people think “fat” is a bad word. Guess what, your mental capabilities are not tied to your physical weight. If this were true, why did I graduate with honors in high school and college, and then again once more in trade school? All of my peers must have been geniuses - only viable explanation according to Merriam-Webster.

Going back to using the word “fat” to describe my body. “Plus size” is fine - though everyone has a different definition of it. Fashion says anything over a 6 is plus. Superfats say you have to be 20+ at least to be fat enough for the term “plus.” Average American women are 16, and now “average” literally correlates to “plus.” No one is ever the correct size. So use whatever you feel comfortable with.

The terms I don't like are as follows: “bbw,” “thick,” “big fine,” “curvy.” I don’t need a special term to describe what my body looks like. I also don’t need your terms to describe what my body looks like. I especially don’t need men’s terms to describe what my body looks like. At this point, many of you are probably going “she has lost it and I don’t know why she doesn’t like these terms because they seem fine to me,” and that is valid. “BBW” reminds me of porn, and I am not a porn star. I am not here for anyone’s sexual needs but my own, and my partner’s. “Thick,” “big fine,” and “curvy” are all terms that men have come up with to tell women “you can be fat, but you can only be fat in certain areas, otherwise you are gross and no one will love you.” Bruh, stfu and gtfoh with this bullshit. Women who are any of those three terms are fat - they have fat, they are fat. Sorry if that doesn’t fit into your little world. Degrees of fatness only perpetuate the idea that there is acceptable fatness in society.

Finally, I see a lot of models and influencers who also perpetuate the idea that there are levels to acceptable fatness. It angers me. These are women whose jobs are literally to influence other fat women and they are telling women “hi, you can be fat, but only if you're fat looks like this and if you workout, and if you’re healthy, because if that isn’t you then you’re not a good kind of fat.” What in the actual fuck. Fat women are telling other fat women that their fatness makes them ugly/unworthy/not good enough. This is real life, I’m not making this up. How can we fix this? I believe these women should be supporting women who don’t look the same way they do. Can we see Ashley Graham support Gabby Sidibe? Can we see Iskra Lawrence support Tess Holliday? We can do better and we need to do better.